'One entered the city like a god; one scuttles in now like a rat' — See beautiful pictures of New York's old Penn Station before it was torn down

These lovely pictures will make you long for Penn Station's glory days.
Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division

It's hard to believe that Manhattan's Pennsylvania Station was once a masterpiece of pink granite, marble columns, and arched-glass windows.

In 1963, the above-ground portion of the station was demolished to make room for a massive sports arena, Madison Square Garden. Its reputation as an architectural masterpiece quickly faded. And most recently several incidents have boosted the station's reputation as a subterranean hellscape.

The station was named for the now-defunct Pennsylvania Railroad, the company that built it. For that same reason, there are also Pennsylvania Stations in cities like Newark and Baltimore.

Construction on the Beaux-Arts-style marvel began in 1901 and took nine years to complete. It was designed by the renowned architectural firm McKim, Mead & White, which also built Columbia University's campus.

In the main waiting room, a bronze statue of Pennsylvania Railroad president Alexander Johnston Cassatt watched over travelers.

In the 1930s, a Greyhound bus station also popped up around the station.

Railroad travel peaked during WWII, and Penn Station was no exception to that surge. But by the 1950s, travel had declined and the station became derelict and grimy due to neglect and the Pennsylvania Railroad's financial woes.

The Pennsylvania Railroad ended up optioning the station's air rights in the 1950s. The above-ground structures would be replaced by Madison Square Garden, while the underground portion of the station would remain.

The new developments caught the public off guard in 1961, when the news appeared in the New York Times. Protests were mounted against the destruction of the landmark building, but the demolition proceeded in October 1963.

"Until the first blow fell, no one was convinced that Penn Station really would be demolished, or that New York would permit this monumental act of vandalism against one of the largest and finest landmarks of its age of Roman elegance," wrote the New York Times's editorial board.

Today, only remnants of the old Penn Station structure survive, like this eagle statue.

The demolition of the landmark train station ended up being one of the defining moments in the history of architectural preservation in the US. Two years after Penn Station was razed, New York City founded its Landmarks Preservation Commission.

That preservation committee went on to help maintain Grand Central's majestic look, which now stands in direct opposition to the modern iteration of Penn Station. As New York Times architecture critic Michael Kimmelman writes, "To pass through Grand Central Terminal, one of New York’s exalted public spaces, is an ennobling experience, a gift. To commute via the bowels of Penn Station, just a few blocks away, is a humiliation."

In the decades since the demolition, Penn Station's usage has increased once more. The New York Times estimates that Penn Station is the busiest transit hub in the Western world — busier than Heathrow Airport in London and Newark, La Guardia, and Kennedy airports in the New York City metro area combined.

To this day, many people lament the destruction of the once-great Manhattan transport hub. As Yale professor Vincent Scully, Jr. told the New York Times in 2012, “One entered the city like a god; one scuttles in now like a rat.”